The Glee Project – Actability

I just realized that I’ve been pronouncing Diana Agrons name wrong since she’s been on the show. Whoops. She’s one of my least favorite characters on Glee unfortunately. I love her in interviews and she seems like she’d be awesome fun in person – case in point, she’s friends with Taylor Swift – but her character is just annoying to me. I know the exact moment I disliked her, becoming a member of the Skanks. The Skanks? Really? The rest of the episode was interesting enough that I honestly almost forgot she’d even been on the show (good thing for notes).

As for the homework assignment, I had a lot of problems with it. I thought Addicted to Love sounded TERRIBLE. I didn’t like anyone performance and I thought they sounded really weird. Michael was the weirdest of them all for me. I know he knew the song but his “determination” look more like constipation. The only one that really did well with his emotion was Blake. Maybe because it’s an easy song to sing angry? Lily and Aylin were absolutely terrible with their weird emotions. Ali was ok but her being excited creeps me out. She lucked out in that her voice did sound the best (in my opinion). I don’t know how Michael won, but congratulations. I’m happy you can say you won the episode (despite the bad news you got at the end of the episode). Poor guy. Congratulations on the minor win.

As far as the video for P!nk’s “Perfect,” I didn’t think the movie characters were totally fair because some people were kind of playing who they are (Aylin), where others were playing something totally different from themselves (Lily). I also think it’s funny that Eric wanted them doing improv in the scenes, because I see Ryan Murphy a little like I see Aaron Sorkin – in that, improv is probably something he loathes. He wants his words heard, not what the actor wants to think of on the fly. I don’t think he wants the actor to have any opinion at all as to what should be said, Ryan just picks his actor because they can convey physically what he writes. I guess improvisation is just a good way to see if someone is a good actor in general. Makes sense.

Their acting was really good though. All of them. Although, It’s kind of ironic that Erik tells them, whatever they say, get to that whole part about being perfect, and yet throughout the whole shoot, I didn’t hear anyone even say the word perfect. I guess they conveyed it to some extent but no one said it which I think is weird because that’s pretty much the only advice the guy gave them.

I totally agreed with Zach about Blake having a very “American Psycho” quality. It was scary good. Maybe if he doesn’t get this role, he can get a roll in American Horror Story?

I actually felt bad for Aylin throughout the little movie. She definitely had the most emotion of all the contestants. Being yelled at by psycho Blake, and then having to wear the head scarf. I can really feel the emotion she has from putting it on. That being said, it probably brought her to that place to make her acting really great (I think Erik might’ve said that exact thing to her actually, but I’ll just say, I agree).

So it comes down to – Who of this 5 is the most inspiring to write for? The writers would be there to find out because all of the contestants were singing. I thought that was the smartest move. They all did well, give them all a chance. I do wish they would’ve let the contestants talk to the writers a little bit instead of Ryan/the judges just giving them a little info on each one before they came out. Maybe they did and we just didn’t see it, but I wouldn’t liked to see it.

Michael – Girls Just Wanna Have Fun – What’s hard about the song he got is that Finn already did it so there’s an obvious comparison. Also I hate this version of the song. And as much as girls might love Michael, they’d love Blake more. Let’s be clear here. They did mention that he’s grown the most over the whole competition (probably not a good sign – compliments like that are ones you take with you when you’re voted off, from what I’ve come to see). The youngest contender (I don’t know why I didn’t realize this until tonight. Err, maybe I should say “I didn’t remember this”)

Lily – Son of a Preacher Man – I thought she did a great job on her performance. I also really liked her hair tonight – a little Adele-ish. I didn’t notice it until tonight but seeing her more, I don’t think she really looks like a high school student. Is it the hair? I mean, she could pass for high school, but of all the 5, she definitely looks the oldest. And do they want a contestant that would have to play a senior? When Ian Brennan kept saying she was “interesting” and then calling her “cloying”, I was a little worried for her safety.

Ali – Here’s to Us – I didn’t know this song. It wasn’t totally my favorite but man, she really gave it in that performance. Slamming down her wheelchair like that? Nice. I also thought that she was vocally the best of the 5 throughout the episode. I liked how they thought they could cast her as a “promiscuous bitch” and later also mentioning that she had a “country blonde” vibe – good sign when they see a character for you. Definitely not something that they have on the show, and Santana won’t be on as much for the “promiscuous bitch” role. This was really her only performance for Ryan so I wonder if she was worried after what happened to Shanna. She sure didn’t show it if she did.

Blake – I’m Still Standing – Before he even started I was about 90% sure he’d be safe. His acting was the best. People keep reminding me that Blake could still lose, too. Whatevs. I noticed the writers noted immediately what Ryans beef with Blake is – no weakness, no vulnerability (“I missed his wound” / “he’s not a misfit”). That being said, maybe it could be interesting to have that one character that has no vulnerabilities. And if a person doesn’t have vulnerabilities, that doesn’t make them a psychopath right? It’s not like he doesn’t have empathy. He just has a lot of self-confidence, and there’s nothing wrong with that. And he did a great job on the song too. So there.

Aylin – Fighter – Forgive me if I think they gave her the easiest song. Maybe they wanted her to rock the vocals because her acting leaves something to be desired compared to Blake/Ali? I would have to disagree. I felt more compassion for her than for the other 2 combined, but maybe that wasn’t acting? I think she’s got a big asterisk of help because she a fresh character for Ryan. I also feel like with what happened last year with Cameron leaving, Ryan would want to keep the person with the best story line. That also being said, if he as the idea for the story line, he could probably audition 100 Aylins to find someone who matches her story line. That’s kind of what he did with Cameron, making Samuel into that character. Well, Samuel kind of made himself into that character but I think it was enough for Ryan having the idea of the character.

I think the judges said it best – do they want the clear star, or the good story line? I do like when all the writers are on (mostly because they tend to agree with me) and because I like to put faces to the people writing my favorite show. And after Shanna’s exit last week, I was pretty sure after seeing all the contestants, I’d know who they wanted in and who they wanted out. That being said, of the top 3 that they chose, damn do they have a tough decision! I think all three of them have awesome qualities/story line ideas. Blakes got the acting down, Ali has the best voice of the 3 and a good plot to follow, and Aylin clearly has the best plot concepts.